Monday, February 26, 2007
Eros Article Summary
A big part of this article goes over the different qualities and effects that Eros or love has on people. It talks about love being a desire beyond all others, but at the same time it talks about how it is also feared by all, even the gods. It brings up the idea of love being like a fire in that it can consume a person and take them over in what is almost a type of control over them. It also talks about love being an uncontrollable force that can take over anyone from wild beasts to the gods in the heavens and how ignorant people seem to be as to the power of this amazing force.
Saturday, February 24, 2007
What is Love?
Love can have many different meanings. For example, love that you have for a spouse may be a lot different than love you have for a brother or sister. Love may come in the form of a strong, lasting friendship or it may go much deeper than that as a married couple may share a more intimate kind of relationship. Maybe a person could even show love toward a pet who they have grown up with. Love can come in all different shapes and sizes even though the love between a married couple seems to be more what people think about.
Life: Dream or Reality?
Adam Kilwine
Instructor: Wayne Berg
English 121-12
Due: 2/23/07
Life: Dream or Reality?
What is Life? Does life have any kind of meaning to it, or is it just some kind of meaningless accident? These are the kinds of questions that have been stumping people since time began, and although many seem to have their own ideas to what might be an answer to these questions, it is impossible to really ever understand the true meaning of it all.
One of the biggest similarities seen through all of these four pieces of writing is that the characters or the authors seem to go on some kind of journey in order to find meaning or purpose in their lives. Whether it is physically, mentally, or spiritually, they all seemed to be in search of an answer to this ultimate question.
Some might wonder if this life that we are all a part of is even reality, or if it is just some kind of dream. How then, can a person really describe reality, and where does a person really find the line between what is real and what is not? Who is a person to really say that a dream is not real or even that life itself is not just one big dream. Two of the readings especially went into this idea.
In “The Circular Ruins” there is a man who comes upon certain ruins where he lays at night to sleep, and it is here that his dreams seem to almost come to life. In his dreams he actually dreams up a person in great detail and it is this person that goes off in search for meaning and it is not until the end that he actually realizes that all he really is, is a dream. From what he thought he knew, he was just an ordinary person, but in reality he was just a dream along with the world around him.
From this reading one has to think about the possibility that if the man in the story was just a dream and he had no idea, then who is to say that this life that we call reality isn’t just one big dream. Then in that case, again, what is the purpose? What is the whole point of this dream and if it is really a dream, then what is real. Many people would say that a dream can’t be considered real, so if that is true, then what is reality? Is there a reality in which the actual people that we represent are living in, or is this just one big dream that a single person, such as maybe God, is dreaming up?
This question then brings up the next reading which is a poem called “Break of Day.” In this reading the author goes deeper into the idea by looking for some kind of meaning for life. In the poem he brings mention to God and considers the effect that he may have on this so-called reality that we live in. He brings up that if God really is the creator, then what is to stop him from just ending the whole thing. What is the purpose for life?
Maybe this life is really just one big dream that he is having, but then why does it keep going? Why doesn’t the dream ever seem to end? Maybe another explanation for life would be that it is all some kind of play that God is putting on for entertainment. Maybe it is just some kind of big experiment. He may have just been experimenting with different ideas such as the change from the dinosaurs to humans, for example. Maybe it isn’t even just one god, but multiple gods in that they are actually the so called reality and this life that we seem to think is real is actually just the dreams of the gods. If people can have dreams like that in which they seem to be in control, then why couldn’t we really just be dreams created by the gods.
It seems to all come back to this question of “why?” Is there really an explanation for these mysteries? It seems to be an impossible question to answer. Even if someone were to really find the reason for life it would just bring them to the next step in the equation. If we were all created for the entertainment of the gods then what is their purpose? If it was all just one big accident such as the big bang theory then why were all these particles that caused it really floating around in space. It is a never-ending process. The only reality that there seems to be is that we are here now in some kind of life whether it be a dream or otherwise, and no one really knows how it all started or how it is going to end.
Instructor: Wayne Berg
English 121-12
Due: 2/23/07
Life: Dream or Reality?
What is Life? Does life have any kind of meaning to it, or is it just some kind of meaningless accident? These are the kinds of questions that have been stumping people since time began, and although many seem to have their own ideas to what might be an answer to these questions, it is impossible to really ever understand the true meaning of it all.
One of the biggest similarities seen through all of these four pieces of writing is that the characters or the authors seem to go on some kind of journey in order to find meaning or purpose in their lives. Whether it is physically, mentally, or spiritually, they all seemed to be in search of an answer to this ultimate question.
Some might wonder if this life that we are all a part of is even reality, or if it is just some kind of dream. How then, can a person really describe reality, and where does a person really find the line between what is real and what is not? Who is a person to really say that a dream is not real or even that life itself is not just one big dream. Two of the readings especially went into this idea.
In “The Circular Ruins” there is a man who comes upon certain ruins where he lays at night to sleep, and it is here that his dreams seem to almost come to life. In his dreams he actually dreams up a person in great detail and it is this person that goes off in search for meaning and it is not until the end that he actually realizes that all he really is, is a dream. From what he thought he knew, he was just an ordinary person, but in reality he was just a dream along with the world around him.
From this reading one has to think about the possibility that if the man in the story was just a dream and he had no idea, then who is to say that this life that we call reality isn’t just one big dream. Then in that case, again, what is the purpose? What is the whole point of this dream and if it is really a dream, then what is real. Many people would say that a dream can’t be considered real, so if that is true, then what is reality? Is there a reality in which the actual people that we represent are living in, or is this just one big dream that a single person, such as maybe God, is dreaming up?
This question then brings up the next reading which is a poem called “Break of Day.” In this reading the author goes deeper into the idea by looking for some kind of meaning for life. In the poem he brings mention to God and considers the effect that he may have on this so-called reality that we live in. He brings up that if God really is the creator, then what is to stop him from just ending the whole thing. What is the purpose for life?
Maybe this life is really just one big dream that he is having, but then why does it keep going? Why doesn’t the dream ever seem to end? Maybe another explanation for life would be that it is all some kind of play that God is putting on for entertainment. Maybe it is just some kind of big experiment. He may have just been experimenting with different ideas such as the change from the dinosaurs to humans, for example. Maybe it isn’t even just one god, but multiple gods in that they are actually the so called reality and this life that we seem to think is real is actually just the dreams of the gods. If people can have dreams like that in which they seem to be in control, then why couldn’t we really just be dreams created by the gods.
It seems to all come back to this question of “why?” Is there really an explanation for these mysteries? It seems to be an impossible question to answer. Even if someone were to really find the reason for life it would just bring them to the next step in the equation. If we were all created for the entertainment of the gods then what is their purpose? If it was all just one big accident such as the big bang theory then why were all these particles that caused it really floating around in space. It is a never-ending process. The only reality that there seems to be is that we are here now in some kind of life whether it be a dream or otherwise, and no one really knows how it all started or how it is going to end.
Sunday, February 11, 2007
Search for Purpose
Adam Kilwine
Instructor: Wayne Berg
English 121-12
Due: 1/12/07
A Journey in Search for Purpose
Although these four pieces of writing show it in very different ways, they all seem to be in search of that ultimate question. The characters in these stories all seem to be searching for some kind of purpose or meaning to their lives, whether it be through some kind of journey into the wilderness or just a journey into their minds and their ideas of the world around them. They go on some kind of quest in order to find themselves and figure out why they are here in the first place.
In the story, “Into the Wild,” a man named Chris McCandless goes off into the Alaskan wilderness in order to actually escape the pressures and expectations of society. In doing so, he challenges himself and takes a huge risk by leaving everything that he has ever known behind him in order to find himself and try to find some kind of purpose in his life. Unfortunately, he probably wasn’t well enough prepared for the journey and he did not survive long enough to make it back home. However, he did the unthinkable by surviving in these terrible conditions for longer than anyone else would even think to do and in his mind it was probably one of the best experiences of his life.
In “The Poem That Took the Place of a Mountain,” Wallace Stevens makes this journey for answers without actually leaving the society around him. Through his journey he almost ignores the ideas of society in order to go after his own goals and live his own unique life. In doing so he finds a kind of completeness in himself that no one else can seem to understand. Though his journey for answers may be quite a bit different than that of Chris McCandless, one idea that really seems to stand out in the two is the separation from society whether it was physically or mentally.
In the next two pieces of literature the author, Jorge Luis Borges, still seems to be in search for this ultimate question, but he brings up the idea of life actually being more of a dream. If life is a dream, however, one has to wonder why the dream continues if it could just as easily be wiped out by the creator, who Borges mentions as possibly being God.
In “Break of Day,” especially, he seems to bring up the idea of life, in general, just being one big dream. Throughout the poem he seems to be searching for some answer to the question of why we are still living this dream. It is here where he brings up the question that if God could easily wipe out all existence in an instant, then why are we still here? What is the purpose, if any, that this dream continues on? This is a question that has stumped people throughout history and is a question that seems impossible to answer.
In “The Circular Ruins,” however, it almost seems to start out in some kind of reality with the man finding the ruins where he then begins to dream up a whole other world. He soon puts time into dreaming up another person in great detail who does not seem to realize that he is, in fact, a dream. It is this person who then goes in search for some kind of meaning and finds out that he is actually some kind of phantasm in this dream world that the man has created. It makes a person start to wonder; if this person was in a dream the entire time without realizing it, what is to say that the world we are living in right now isn’t also some kind of dream that could just end at any time.
Instructor: Wayne Berg
English 121-12
Due: 1/12/07
A Journey in Search for Purpose
Although these four pieces of writing show it in very different ways, they all seem to be in search of that ultimate question. The characters in these stories all seem to be searching for some kind of purpose or meaning to their lives, whether it be through some kind of journey into the wilderness or just a journey into their minds and their ideas of the world around them. They go on some kind of quest in order to find themselves and figure out why they are here in the first place.
In the story, “Into the Wild,” a man named Chris McCandless goes off into the Alaskan wilderness in order to actually escape the pressures and expectations of society. In doing so, he challenges himself and takes a huge risk by leaving everything that he has ever known behind him in order to find himself and try to find some kind of purpose in his life. Unfortunately, he probably wasn’t well enough prepared for the journey and he did not survive long enough to make it back home. However, he did the unthinkable by surviving in these terrible conditions for longer than anyone else would even think to do and in his mind it was probably one of the best experiences of his life.
In “The Poem That Took the Place of a Mountain,” Wallace Stevens makes this journey for answers without actually leaving the society around him. Through his journey he almost ignores the ideas of society in order to go after his own goals and live his own unique life. In doing so he finds a kind of completeness in himself that no one else can seem to understand. Though his journey for answers may be quite a bit different than that of Chris McCandless, one idea that really seems to stand out in the two is the separation from society whether it was physically or mentally.
In the next two pieces of literature the author, Jorge Luis Borges, still seems to be in search for this ultimate question, but he brings up the idea of life actually being more of a dream. If life is a dream, however, one has to wonder why the dream continues if it could just as easily be wiped out by the creator, who Borges mentions as possibly being God.
In “Break of Day,” especially, he seems to bring up the idea of life, in general, just being one big dream. Throughout the poem he seems to be searching for some answer to the question of why we are still living this dream. It is here where he brings up the question that if God could easily wipe out all existence in an instant, then why are we still here? What is the purpose, if any, that this dream continues on? This is a question that has stumped people throughout history and is a question that seems impossible to answer.
In “The Circular Ruins,” however, it almost seems to start out in some kind of reality with the man finding the ruins where he then begins to dream up a whole other world. He soon puts time into dreaming up another person in great detail who does not seem to realize that he is, in fact, a dream. It is this person who then goes in search for some kind of meaning and finds out that he is actually some kind of phantasm in this dream world that the man has created. It makes a person start to wonder; if this person was in a dream the entire time without realizing it, what is to say that the world we are living in right now isn’t also some kind of dream that could just end at any time.
Wednesday, February 7, 2007
Dreamworld
In the story, "Circular Ruins" and the poem, "Break of Day," the biggest link that I can find between them is this idea of life being some kind of dreamworld. In "Circular Ruins" a man fins some ruins in the jungle and when he falls asleep he dreams and manages to actually dream up a person who does not seem to that it is a dream. Then in "Break of Day" the author questions whether we, ourselves, are actually living in a dream world and tries to find a reason for it all. He mentions that god could just take it all away in a second and looks for a reason why we are still here. In both of the pieces of writing I believe that the author brings up the idea of a dreamworld in order bring up the big question of the meaning of life.
Metaphor
I looked up metaphor in the Webster's dictionary and it was described as "a figure of speech in which one thing is spoken of as if it were another."
Saturday, February 3, 2007
A Search for Solitude
Adam Kilwine
Instructor: Wayne Berg
English 121-12
Due: 1/31/07
A Search for Solitude
Although many people throughout the world either live life within the expectations of society or surrender to these expectations at some point in their life; most, if not all people seem to take some kind of “soul-flight” in there lifetime. One person’s soul-flight may be much different from another’s, but it all seems to be an attempt to challenge themselves or break apart from the rest of the world in order to find themselves in the process. Although the story, “Into the Wild,” by Jon Krakauer and “The Poem that Took the Place of a Mountain,” are two very different forms of writing by two different authors, they both seem to go into this idea of a soul-flight.
In “The Poem that Took the Place of a Mountain,” Wallace Stevens seems to use this mountain in order to represent his life and how he has lived his life his own way instead of surrendering to the expectations of society. In the poem he seems to bring up his uniqueness and seems to feel a completeness in himself that most people in normal society might not understand. In this way he seems to have gone into some kind of solitary in his mind without actually removing himself from the people around him.
Chris McCandless, however, took a little different approach in the story, “Into the Wild.” He actually decided to remove himself completely from society. In doing so he traveled out into the Alaskan wilderness in order to prove to himself that he was strong enough and intelligent enough to survive on his own without any help from other people. He managed to survive for months on his own in this wilderness and by the time he started back home he seems to have had a great cense of pride and self-confidence. Unfortunately he was unable to find a way across the river that he had crossed at the beginning of his journey and wasn’t able to survive long enough to get back home. It’s true that he was probably not very well prepared for such a dangerous journey, but he lasted much longer than most people could and for that reason he deserves more credit than he has actually received.
Even Jon Krakauer, in the search for McCandless and his inspiration for this story seems to have taken a soul-flight. Although he was traveling with someone, it was like he was trying to prove something to himself through his journey and was not about to give up, no matter what obstacles he might encounter on his way.
Wallace Stevens, Chris McCandless, and Jon Krakauer were all very different people who made an effort to somehow separate themselves from society in order to find themselves and prove what they were really made of. Many people will go through life doing nothing but what society tells them to do, but it is things like this that will stick with them forever and many become much better people because of it.
Instructor: Wayne Berg
English 121-12
Due: 1/31/07
A Search for Solitude
Although many people throughout the world either live life within the expectations of society or surrender to these expectations at some point in their life; most, if not all people seem to take some kind of “soul-flight” in there lifetime. One person’s soul-flight may be much different from another’s, but it all seems to be an attempt to challenge themselves or break apart from the rest of the world in order to find themselves in the process. Although the story, “Into the Wild,” by Jon Krakauer and “The Poem that Took the Place of a Mountain,” are two very different forms of writing by two different authors, they both seem to go into this idea of a soul-flight.
In “The Poem that Took the Place of a Mountain,” Wallace Stevens seems to use this mountain in order to represent his life and how he has lived his life his own way instead of surrendering to the expectations of society. In the poem he seems to bring up his uniqueness and seems to feel a completeness in himself that most people in normal society might not understand. In this way he seems to have gone into some kind of solitary in his mind without actually removing himself from the people around him.
Chris McCandless, however, took a little different approach in the story, “Into the Wild.” He actually decided to remove himself completely from society. In doing so he traveled out into the Alaskan wilderness in order to prove to himself that he was strong enough and intelligent enough to survive on his own without any help from other people. He managed to survive for months on his own in this wilderness and by the time he started back home he seems to have had a great cense of pride and self-confidence. Unfortunately he was unable to find a way across the river that he had crossed at the beginning of his journey and wasn’t able to survive long enough to get back home. It’s true that he was probably not very well prepared for such a dangerous journey, but he lasted much longer than most people could and for that reason he deserves more credit than he has actually received.
Even Jon Krakauer, in the search for McCandless and his inspiration for this story seems to have taken a soul-flight. Although he was traveling with someone, it was like he was trying to prove something to himself through his journey and was not about to give up, no matter what obstacles he might encounter on his way.
Wallace Stevens, Chris McCandless, and Jon Krakauer were all very different people who made an effort to somehow separate themselves from society in order to find themselves and prove what they were really made of. Many people will go through life doing nothing but what society tells them to do, but it is things like this that will stick with them forever and many become much better people because of it.
Break of Day
This poem brings up the idea that life and everything involved may just be one big dream. From here he goes through the idea of a dream and tries to almost find some kind of purpose in this dream that we call life. He brings up that it would be very easy for god to just take it all away in an instant. If this is true, why doesn't it happen? Why are we still living in this dreamworld. In a way, I think that Wallace Stevens kind of brings this up in "The Poem that Took the Place of a Mountain," in that he is kind of trying to find the reason for life or his purpose in his own life. He then finds some completeness in knowing that he has separated himself from the group and lived life for himself and not based on the expectations that influence a person's decisions throughout life.
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